An End to a Dangerous Fast

Thatcher stands firm, and the hunger strike is called off

It was perhaps the best Christmas present that British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, Irish Prime Minister Charles Haughey and the often warring, always uneasy Protestants and Catholics of Northern Ireland could have received. Last week, 53 days after they had begun to fast, seven Irish Republican terrorists imprisoned in the gray concrete H-block cells of Belfast's Maze Prison started to eat again. The end to the long hunger strike came as at least one of the prisoners lay near death, an event that authorities feared would inevitably have sparked a new wave of I.R.A. bombings and shootings throughout Northern Ireland and England.

The hunger strikers' capitulation was widely seen as a psychological victory for Thatcher, who from the very start refused to bow to the prisoners' demands, principally that they be treated as special-category political prisoners rather than as ordinary convicts. When the seven first refused food, on Oct. 27, they spoke of fasting "until death." Their privations and the frequent reports of their worsening health turned them into near martyrs and quickly raised sectarian tensions throughout the troubled North. Catholics demanded at least a compromise, while Protestants insisted that there be "no surrender." Thatcher held firm.

It was a close call. Last week one of the seven strikers, Sean McKenna, 26, sentenced to 25 years for terrorist offenses including the attempted murders of a policeman and a Protestant civilian, was reported to be going blind from lack of food. He was described as comatose and close to death; a visiting relative said he looked like a "yellow skeleton." Amid warnings that McKenna had only 24 hours to live, prison authorities brought in a priest to give him the last rites of the Roman Catholic Church. After the strike was called off, the fear remained that he might still die even though he was immediately transferred to a Belfast hospital.

In the end, the strike was not halted by any secret deal. At a summit meeting in Dublin earlier this month Thatcher and Haughey had agreed on how to proceed. The striking prisoners were then sent a 32-page British position paper that made it clear that London would never grant them political status. The document, however, did indicate that Britain was prepared to consider prison reforms once the fast had ended. There was a hint that some of the strikers' other demands --such as the right to wear civilian clothes --might in the end be granted.

The turning point came early in the week, when Tomas Cardinal O'Fiaich, the Catholic Primate of All Ireland, sent a telegram to Thatcher pleading with her to intervene. The Iron Lady's refusal to do so, combined with her plea that the strikers "take the course of life rather than the course of death," apparently convinced them that they could not win. On Thursday evening they called off the protest. The next day, 33 other Republican prisoners, who had been fasting for up to 19 days in support of the original seven, gave up.

Word of the strike's end was greeted with joy by moderate Ulstermen of both religions. "My first reaction on hearing the news," said Cardinal O'Fiaich, "is a fervent 'Thank God.' " Even Thatcher's political enemies in Westminster, the Labor opposition, were full of praise. Said Don Concannon, Labor chief spokesman on Northern Ireland affairs: "It would be churlish not to congratulate you."

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so viewer discretion is required.